Whadup Peeps!
Today I wanted to update you a bit about where I’m at with all I am doing. Most of you know that my big passion is in showing the similarities between animals and people and really blurring the human/rest of the animal kingdom line. I’ve been really lucky to have been able to do quite a lot of this blurring work through one-off TV appearances but it has always been my dream to host my own television series or become a documentary film maker.
Over the past six months or so I’ve had a fire under my bum and have been doing some serious thinking about just how to make this happen. I’ve been fluttering around to as many industry events as possible and took one of Ruth Cullen’s short courses in documentary making. The course provided practical information and was totally inspiring for me. It made me realise that with an inspired vision, hard work, and a video camera there really aren’t any limits to what you can achieve.
You don’t need to have all the right connections, you don’t need to be “discovered” – you just have to get out there and get started. Before I took the course I was focussing mostly on finding a production company to partner with and I’m still exploring that avenue (with some very exciting prospects!) but thanks to Ruth I now know that should I choose to, there’s no reason I couldn’t produce a feature length wildlife doco myself.
The big hang up, though, as I’m sure many of you can relate to, is I have to earn an income if I want to be able to eat and pay my rent. If I was an established documentary maker I would probably be able to get someone to fork over some money for me to use to finance my project (and live on) but as a relative newcomer to the industry there aren’t many funding bodies who would want to do that for me just yet. To make a film at this stage in my career I’m probably going to have to finance it myself or at least get it started by myself so I can show the funding bodies what I’m capable of. I love my job, though, so not being able to leave it any time soon isn’t something that really bothers me.
I’m thinking that what I should do to get started is start heading out on short ventures into wild New South Wales to begin collecting some stock footage to use in my film (or series, not sure yet). I’m hoping that with that and a really strong plan and vision for the project I’ll be able to get the money to keep going.
When I came to this realisation (that I can go ahead and get started NOW) I actually freaked a little. Suddenly everything seemed really, really real. I went from having a dream to having a goal and that was both awesome and scary. The scary thing was that I realised I really need to get my finances in order because with where I’m at right now there’s no way I can afford to be buying professional video equipment. Honestly, at the moment I don’t think I can even afford the petrol to go camping (it costs me $60 on average to fill up my car here) so that’s not good.
Luckily, my reason for having f-all moneywise is that I’ve been pushing hard to pay off my credit card. I’m on track right now to have my credit card debt ELIMINATED by the time my pay hits my bank account next week. Hello, Awesome!! Unfortunately, though, my 200,000 km car service is coming up which is going to cost me at least $1400 or maybe closer to $2000 if I need new tires. I also have to buy flights and put away spending money for a trip to the US in September (for a wedding) which is going to set me back another $2500 at least.
It all seems a bit daunting but if I can stay focussed and committed (and invest in a lot of Top Ramen) I have a feeling I will be able to put away the money for all of that within 4 or 5 months and be on the ground filming by spring. In the mean time I’ll be writing, researching, and saving saving saving!
Wish me luck!!
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